$5 MILLION TO CONTRAS ILLEGAL, RECORDS HINT

James O`Shea and Michael Tackett, Chicago TribuneCHICAGO TRIBUNE

Records of secret Swiss bank accounts suggest that about $5 million in profits from U.S. arms sales to Iran was diverted to the Nicaraguan contras at a time when U.S. aid to the rebels was illegal, sources close to a congressional investigation say.

The records, obtained by congressional investigators trying to determine what happened to $20 million in proceeds from the sales, also indicate that some money remains in one of the Swiss accounts used in the secret operation. ''I don`t know exactly how much is in there,'' a source said, ''but it is less than $10 million.''

A special committee investigating the arms sales reported earlier this year that Iran paid out an estimated $54 million during the weapons transactions undertaken by the United States in the hope of freeing American hostages held by Iranian-backed terrorists in Lebanon.

The vice chairman of the Senate committee investigating the Iran arms sales, Sen. Warren Rudman (R., N.H.), has said some of the money was misappropriated. He indicated the investigators would be able to show that price mark-ups on weapons and commissions paid to middlemen in the affair were excessive.

Rudman also said that portions of President Reagan`s diary reviewed by the investigators indicated that he was not as out of touch with the operation as was indicated in a report by the Reagan-appointed Tower Board.

Once the board deducted the cost of the U.S. weapons and amounts paid to Iranian middlemen and Israeli arms dealers involved in the transactions, about $20 million remained unaccounted for.

Government memos and comments by Marine Lt. Col. Oliver North, the National Security Council aide fired last November for his role in the affair, suggest that all or part of the missing $20 million might have been diverted to the U.S.-backed contras fighting to topple the leftist Sandinista government in Nicaragua.

A source with knowledge of the congressional investigation said the secret Swiss bank records obtained from Albert Hakim, an Iranian-born businessman who helped arrange the arms sales and the contra resupply effort, appear to indicate that only about $5 million of the $20 million was diverted to help the rebels buy arms and equipment.

Sources said the remainder of the funds went for items such as insurance premiums on the arms shipments and for commissions of as much as 300 percent that were paid to corporations controlled by middlemen such as Hakim and his business partner, retired Air Force Maj. Gen. Richard Secord.

One source said he didn`t know the exact amount of the commissions or exactly who ended up with the money. But he and other sources indicated that profit was a goal of the middlemen recruited by the White House to circumvent a 1984 congressional ban on direct or indirect military aid to the contras.

The ban was lifted last fall after Congress approved a $100 million aid package.

A former CIA operative involved in the contra supply operations earlier had complained to Vice President George Bush`s office that Secord and Thomas Clines, a former CIA agent and another business associate of the general`s, were charging the contras exorbitant prices for shoddy equipment.

According to a senior administration official, Secord and his partners sold the contras $3 hand grenades for $9 each.

But sources close to the investigation said the commissions were not the only factors that drove costs high.

''If you have a plane loaded with weapons that you want to fly into Tehran,'' the source said, ''not many people want to insure it. So you get hit with an awfully high insurance premium.'' The source said the insurance was needed so the White House operation could secretly charter a plane.

He said bank records supplied by Hakim provide a ''fairly comprehensive'' account of the transactions, including the insurance premiums, commissions and other costs. He said the investigators still were poring over them to determine if any federal laws had been broken.

Public hearings on the arms sales investigation are to start May 5.

A Senate source said investigators also have tracked most of the money given to the contras through North`s secret White House drive to solicit funds from private citizens and U.S. allies.

Overall, the White House contra aid network raised about $100 million through contributions from foreign governments and private citizens and allowable U.S. aid, according to government records and congressional sources. The aid apparently included $32 million from Saudi Arabia, $10 million from the Sultan of Brunei, $27 million in U.S. government ''humanitarian''

assistance, $10 million each from Taiwan and South Korea and the remainder from conservative fundraisers, currency transactions, donations of goods and services, and other small financial contributions.

The $54 million raised from the arms sales to Iran was in addition to these contributions and represents the gross amount of money that Iran paid to middlemen for U.S. arms, according to the Tower Board report, issued Feb. 26. Of that total, the Tower Board estimated that $19.8 million was available for diversion to the contras, and the remainder was paid to middlemen and the Pentagon for the U.S. missiles and missile parts.

The Senate source said the investigators have traced 90 percent to 95 percent of the $154 million total.